Philips has said it’s mulling over the idea of launching its first QD-OLED TVs next year. The company would become only the third brand in the world to launch such a TV if it decides to go ahead, after Samsung Electronics and Sony.
It could well be a smart move by Philips. QD-OLED is a new display technology that was developed by Samsung Display. It combines the superior contrast and fine detail of traditional OLED with the vibrant colours and brightness afforded by quantum dots. The first QD-OLED TV sets were launched this year - the Sony A95K and the Samsung S95B - and both sets received rave reviews.
The revelation that it’s considering making QD-OLED TVs came during HDTVTest’s interview (below) with Danny Tack, director of product strategy and planning at Philip’s parent company TP Vision.
"We are also exploring the quantum dot OLED panel from Samsung," he told HDTVTest’s Vincent Teoh. "We also have prototypes in-house in Ghent in our innovation centre and we are comparing both with each other looking through strengths and weaknesses".
Philips will make a decision on whether to launch a QD-OLED TV “later”, Tack said. The company is planning to reveal its 2023 TV lineup in February, so we imagine a decision will be reached before then.
Philips isn’t entirely new to QD-OLED, for it recently launched its first gaming monitor boasting the new display technology.
However, the decision remains up in the air for now. Also in the interview, Tack promised that next year’s Philips OLED TVs will be able to achieve even higher brightness than its existing models. The superior brightness of QD-OLED is one of its main selling points, so if Philips can somehow match that with its regular OLED TVs, it might decide there’s no real need to launch a QD-OLED television as well.
Still, fans of Philips will no doubt be hoping that the company does opt to embrace QD-OLED. The world’s very first QD-OLED TV, the Samsung A95K, is an absolutely stunning TV in every respect, delivering sensational pictures that easily rival those of LG’s flagship LG G2 OLED TV. Teoh described the A95K as the “TV to beat” in 2022 and we’ve yet to see anything that definitively surpasses its image quality. So the prospect of a Philips TV complete with its endearing Ambilight mood lighting tech is an exciting one that may just give Sony a run for its money.
